


I'll Always Keep You With Me (You'll Be Always On My Mind)

by Lilsciencequeen



Category: Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. (TV)
Genre: AOS Net New Year Exchange, Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Angst, Angst with a Happy Ending, Blood, Canon-Typical Violence, F/M, The Framework Universe (Marvel)
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-01-04
Updated: 2018-01-04
Packaged: 2019-02-28 09:28:04
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 6,024
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13268553
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Lilsciencequeen/pseuds/Lilsciencequeen
Summary: “And I love him!” The words escaped Jemma before she even knew that she was really saying them, but once they had left her, she knew that she couldn’t take them back. They had been said, and they were out in the world now.// A Framework Bus Kids Au





	I'll Always Keep You With Me (You'll Be Always On My Mind)

**Author's Note:**

  * For [TashxTARDIS](https://archiveofourown.org/users/TashxTARDIS/gifts).



> For @fitzsimmonsftw over on tumblr, I was your AOS net exchange partner for the new year, and your prompt was amazing! I had so much fun writing it, and I really hope that you enjoy it!
> 
> A massive thanks to stjarna too for helping me with this! 
> 
>  
> 
> Prompt: A framework AU where Fitz realises whats going on in episode 17 and reaches out to Jemma.

“And I love him!” The words escaped Jemma before she even knew that she was really saying them, but once they had left her, she knew that she couldn’t take them back. They had been said, and they were out in the world now.

Both Ward and Coulson stared at her in shock, they look downright horrified that she had just admitted that she loved him, The Doctor, one of Hydra’s most notorious. She had no idea what he had done (and she had no intention of knowing, no intention of looking up what he had done, because it wasn’t Fitz. It wasn’t _her_ Fitz. It was Aida, the Darkhold doing all of this. Not Fitz. Never Fitz).

“You love him?” Ward asked, his voice shocked as if he couldn’t comprehend what Jemma was saying, as if he couldn’t believe that this doe-eyed girl, who had claimed to have been murdered by Hydra, who had climbed out of her own grave, had just admitted she had feelings for one of the most dangerous men in the world. Cursing, he turned to Coulson. “I knew that we shouldn't have trusted her. That we shouldn’t have come here. It’s a trap. She’s one of _them_.” He started to raise his own gun again, pointing it at Fitz once more.

“No,” Jemma began to try and explain, tears streaking faster and faster down her face. “No I just… I need to talk to him… I need to get to him. Please.”

“He’s dangerous!” And with those two words, he took aim, his finger about to pull the trigger when one thing stopped him.

Fitz shooting Anges point blank in the chest.

Blood blossomed from the woman’s chest, a bloody red rose before she fell lifeless to the ground.

But Jemma, she never really saw that.

What she saw instead was Fitz, as she stood up, as she screamed one word, the two letters tearing their way out of her throat.

Upon hearing her, he turned, facing her, and a look of confusion swept across his face as he stared across the grounds to her. He looked so confused, he looked as though he were remembering something, but it was at this point all hell broke loose.

Ward fired of a single shot, the bullet hitting, and killing one of the Hydra guards. Coulson behind her spoke gently as she stepped forward, begging her not to go any closer, begging her to come back with them, promising her that they would work something out together, that they could get to Fitz one way or another.

But she ignored them all, continuing to step forward, all Hydra guns pointed on her. No one fired a shot, everyone waiting to see what would happen next. “Fitz,” she whispered, hoping that she could get across to him, hoping that she could free him from whatever AIDA had done to him.

Aida…

The very woman was standing there, a cold, calculating smile on her face as she watched Jemma make her way closer to them. “Get her.” The two words left her were merciless and Jemma didn’t even try and fight.

She knew that to get to Fitz, she had to allow herself to be capture, that she had to get closer to him, so she raised her arms, surrendering.

One of the guards walked towards her, gun still raised, still pointed at Jemma’s chest. She heard faintly Ward and Coulson arguing, Coulson saying that they had to get Jemma but Ward arguing that it was a waste of time, that they had to leave, and they had to leave _now_.

When the guard finally reached her, lowering his weapon when he saw that she was defenseless, when he saw that there were no tricks up her sleeve, when he saw that he was really surrendering. He forced her arms down behind her back, with so much more force than was really necessary, and placed her in handcuffs.

They marched her to the QuinJet, to where both Fitz and Aida where waiting, Aida with a victorious smug smirk on her face, whereas Fitz had one of confusion on his. He looked like he was trying to work something out, like he was trying to solve a puzzle.

“Jemma Simmons?” he asked when she reached them.

Jemma nodded, unable to speak, having lost her voice.

“Excellent,” Aida replied, her gaze flicking over to Fitz. “Your father will be most impressed.”

His father. He was here, in the Framework, and obviously part of Fitz’s life. But she wasn’t able to get any further, wasn’t able to think of anything else, as there was a sudden pain at the back of her head and then darkness.

***

“You found her, the submissive. Brought her in. I’m impressed son,” his father told him, but his mind was a million miles away. In fact, it was in a different reality. It was back in the real world in fact, and he was still trying to wrap his mind around what had happened.

He was trying comprehend the fact that Aida had taken him, and most of the team, and had forced him into this life, had forced him to become this. And now Jemma was here to, possibly to rescue him, probably to rescue him.

Was she alone?

Was there anyone with her?

Was there anyone on the other side?

Then it came to him.

Daisy was with him.

She had to be. She had been acting odd the past couple days. Acting unlike how the Doctor was used to.

So she must be with Jemma.

The two of them must have went into the Framework to try and pull them out. He just had to get them out now. The three of them.

They could do it, surely? They had faced so much more than this before, and they had survived.

He just had to get to the both of them.

“Has she spoken? Said anything?” he asked his father, knowing that he had to play along, act as the Doctor.

His father shook his head. “Not yet. But we’ll break her. We’ll get her. She’ll speak at one point.”

“Let me. Let me speak to her.”

His father spun to him, his face indecipherable. “You?”

Fitz nodded. “How many have I broken? How many have spilled their secrets simply because they wanted the pain to stop?”

After one moment too long, Alistair nodded. “Very well. But I want to have information by the end of the day. I want to know who she is, how she came back from the dead and what part she plays in the Resistance.”

“I won’t let you down father.”

***

He arrived at her room (well, it was more a cell but the technicalities didn’t matter at the moment) and he ensured the cameras won’t give him away.

“Jemma Simmons,” he spoke, trying to make his voice as soft as he could. She looked up, her hair hanging around her face, one side of it already swollen and bruised. “Jems,” he then said, what little he had left breaking. “What happened?”

“Fitz?” she asked. “Is that you? Is that really you?”

He nodded, taking a step forward, sitting in the seat opposite her. “It is. It is me.”

“Prove it. How do I know it’s you?”

“I took you back to mine when you had too much to drink at New Years in our final year at the Academy. When you came back from Maveth, you fell asleep with your head on me knee. Your favourite constellation is Gemini. It reminds you of your father, of the nights that you spent together. We went to the Grand Canyon after… after Hive and it was that night you told me you loved me for the first time. And you can’t, you can’t sleep unless you tell me that you love me, and the nights that I’m away, they’re hard for you. You can’t sleep properly those nights.”

“It’s you,” she breathed. “It’s really you.”

He nodded, smiling at her, and cupping the side of her face that was not bruised. “It is, and I’m so so sorry.”

“You don’t have to apologise, you’re safe. You’re alive. I thought that I lost you,” she told him as he stroked her face with this thumb, wiping away the tears that she was silently crying.

“And we’re going to get out of here, all of us. Alive. Okay, but I need you to do something for me, yeah? Can you just, can you just stick this out for another couple of hours? Please?”

She nodded, and he smiled at her. “I can. I’ll, I’ll be okay. You don’t have to worry about me.”

He laughed at this, shaking his head. “I’m always gonna worry about you Jems. I just… I need to get Daisy. And Radcliffe, and we can work out what to do next, yeah? Was Daisy the only one who came in with you?”

“Yeah,” Jemma told him. “Just us too. Piper, Prince, Davis and Elena are keeping an eye on us from our side.”

“Okay, okay that’s good.” He leaned over and pressed a kiss to her forehead. “I’ll be back soon. I love you.”

“I love you too.”

***

“Skye.”

“Skye.”

“Daisy.”

It was when he hissed her chose name that she turned and walked back down the corridor towards him, where he was hiding in a doorway. “Fitz? As in our Fitz?”

He nodded. “Yeah, you have Inhumans power. I told you it was okay. When Jemma got taken by the Monolith you, you told me it was going to be okay. You were the one who had the most faith in me. You helped me to relax, forced me to watch all those awful horror films…” he couldn't continue as she was running towards him, and throwing her arms around him.

“It’s you,” she whispered.

He nodded against her, pulling her into an embrace too. “I’ve missed you. But we need, we need to get out of here. They have Jemma, they’re holding her down there.”

“I know, but how, how do we get her out of there?”

He reached inside his jacket and pulled something out of his pocket. It was long, blue and slightly transparent. “Is that?” Daisy began, looking at what he was holding, wide eyed.

“A crystal? Yeah, yeah it is. Are you prepared to…” He didn’t even get to finish his question as she was already nodding.

“I am,” she told him as he dropped the crystal, the very thing shattering into various blue shards on the ground, a puff of blue smoke escaping it as he did so. Stone soon began to encass Daisy, working its way up her, and seconds later, shards exploded everywhere as she regained her powers. “What next?”

Fitz chewed on his lip, trying to remember his plan, and also how much time the two of them had until they got caught. He had managed to reprogram the security cameras, but he knew that they wouldn't last for long, that someone would soon catch on to what had been done. “We get Jemma, and Radcliffe. He helped to make this world, he knows the way out.”

“And the others?” Daisy asked. “Coulson, Mack…”

“They’re all alive, I know where they are… but we can’t get them. It’s too risky. If I can get out too, and we’re being kept in the same location, which we probably are, then I can get them out from our side. Are you in the base?”

A pause as Daisy didn’t know how to explain that. “Not at the moment… we’re on the Zerphy.”

“I can contact you, as soon as we’re all out, and then I can get the others out as you come.”

Daisy nodded, understanding the plan and knowing that it made perfect sense. “And is Radcliffe here?”

“Yeah, yeah he is. He was taken in when I… when I killed Agnes.” He trailed over, his mind wondering to something else.

“Were you awake? Were you you?” Daisy quickly asked, knowing what was about to happen. That Fitz was about to blame himself for what had happened, that he felt that it was his fault.

Slowly, the engineer shook his head. “No, no. That’s when, that’s when I saw Jemma. That’s when I woke up. When she screamed at what I had done.”

“It wasn’t you,” Daisy told him, reaching over and taking his hand in her own. “Trust me. I know, I know it’s hard to believe it, but you weren’t in your right mind. It _wasn’t_ you.”

Fitz just continued to chew on the inside of his lip. “We need to move.”

***

They had Jemma just under an hour later, it had taken time for Fitz to get the guards away from her, and when he laid eyes on her once again, he was more than thankful to see that she had not been harmed any further.

“Fitz,” she whispered as he uncuffed her, and helped her to stand. It was only after that she was able to hug him, wrapping her arms around him and pulling him close. He didn’t smell like her Fitz at all. This Fitz smelt too sharp and too clean but it was still her Fitz. He knew just how to hold her, just how to hug her.

“I’m sorry,” he whispered and she shook her head.

“It wasn’t your fault. It was never your fault,” she tried to reassure him, leaning back and reaching up to craddle his cheek.

“What did I ever do to deserve you?” he asked, a brokenness in his voice she had never heard before.

“Don’t say that.” Her voice was nothing more than a whisper as she tilted her head up, allowing herself to kiss him. “Never say that. Because I love you Fitz. And you deserve me. Every part of me, and please, never forget that, okay?”

He nodded, about to say something else when Daisy cut in. “I really hate to break up this reunion, but we don’t have much time, right? And we still need to get out of here, still need to get Radcliffe.”

Fitz pulled away from Jemma, stroking the unjuried side of her face, hating that someone had hurt her that way at the same time. “I’m sorry, but we need to leave.”

An understanding nod came from Jemma. “It’s okay. Do we, do we have a plan?”

“The basics just,” he began as he allowed his hand to interlock with hers. “Not much, but it’s something to go on.”

“It’s better than nothing,” she continued as they exited the cell and walked down the corridor, her glance flickering to the security cameras every once in a while. Thankfully though, Fitz had managed to deactivate them, force them to show lies to the security staff for a while, at least until they escaped hopefully. And Radcliffe’s cell was only down the corridor from hers.

The door to it didn’t last long as Daisy damaged the lock to it, the heavy metal swinging open and banging loudly. Radcliffe looked up from his position on the floor, his face morphing into a mask of confusion. Then it hit him. “You’ve did it. You’ve woken him up. You both came in here and woke him up.” There was a sense of awe to his voice.

“We have,” Daisy explained, storming into the room with such power and grace, and hauled the older man up of the floor. “And we’re leaving now.”

She started to leave, Fitz and Jemma turning to follow her but Radcliffe remained froze. “How?” he demanded, causing the others to spin around and face him once again. “How are we leaving?”

“A jet?” Daisy answered as if it were the most obvious thing in the world.

“Jemma’s one of the most wanted people at the moment, and if you and Fitz help the two of us escape, it’s going to cause some noise. People are going to notice. _Aida_ is going to notice”

“Yeah,” Daisy continued, as if Radcliffe were missing the obvious. “That’s why we’re leaving now.”

And as the three of them left, Radcliffe reamined frozen on the spot for a second, before hurrying out after them.

***

They were still in the air two hours later, the Jet circling to try and throw the Hydra agents that were inevitably on their case now.

Jemma and Fitz were sitting side by side, their hands resting in his hand, interlaced and interlocked.

They had discussed and finalised their plan, deciding that Fitz pulling the others out from the real world and Jemma, Daisy and the others going to meet them would be the safest option. Radcliffe had even told them where they were being held. They knew that it could be a trick, that it could be a lie, but it was the best they had at the moment.

Before landing however, Fitz pulled Radcliffe to the side, rubbing anxiously at the back of his neck. “I wanted… I wanted to apologise for Agnes… I shouldn’t have done that, shouldn’t have killed her.”

“She was already dead.”

The four words threw Fitz, and he just stared at the man that he had once respected. “Already?”

Radcliffe nodded. “She didn’t survive in our world. The illness, it killed her. I though life here would be better, that we could have our happy ending. I didn’t fare much better either.”

“You’re dead?”

Another nod from Radcliffe. “Aida though she was protecting the Framework. That she was doing what she was programed what she was to do. I don’t… I’m not angry about what happened, about Agnes, we could never have our happy ending, our life together. You just… you have to stop her, have to destroy the entire LMD program. It’s too dangerous. I don’t… you and Jemma deserve happiness, you deserve a life together. I just..”

“I promise,” Fitz said, looking Radcliffe in the eyes. “I promise.”

“We're nearly there,” Daisy interrupted, coming to the darkened corner where the two Scotsmen where. “No sign of Hydra or Aida. At least not yet.”

Fitz nodded, looking over Daisy’s shoulder at where Jemma was sitting, her head resting against the metal of the plane, her eyes closed as she slept. She was hiding something, not telling him something. He just knew it. He just didn't know what yet. He had tried to ask Daisy about it but she had bit her lip nervously and said that it wasn't her place to say. At least not yet

“Well,” Radcliffe began, a nervous eagerness in his voice as he rubbed his hands together. “Let's get ready. Shall we?”

***

“You're hiding something.” It was an observation and not a question and Jemma spun to face him and from the look on her face, it was evident she didn't want to discuss it. “You can tell me, you know that Jemma. You can tell me anything.”

A pause and then a sigh. “When you… when you were taken you were replaced. By an LMD. It walked like you. It talked like you. It was… it was… I fell for it. It tricked me. And we… we were alone together and he...it made me think I was the LMD. So I forced it to cut itself, not knowing if it was you or not.” She gave a harsh laugh, as if she were chastising herself for what had happened. For what she had done. “It could have been you and I could have made you hurt yourself.”

“Jemma…” he tried to cut in but couldn't.

“But it wasn't me who was the LMD. It was… it was you but I didn't... I didn't know until I saw you because there was so much blood Fitz that it had… that it had to have been me that was the LMD. So I went over, I tried to help and…” She stopped. Trailing off as she did so. She seemed scared to continue. As if she were worried she had said too much.

“What happened? Jemma, what did it do?” He took her hands in his own, rubbing his thumbs over the back of them.

She took in a shaking breath, and looked down at her hands, now in his own. It felt odd, this Fitz’s hands, they were nothing like back in the real world. They were two soft, as if they hadn’t been damaged by years of work. She knew that the man, in a sense, in front of her was _Fitz_ , was _her_ Fitz. But he also wasn’t. His mind may have been his own but this body, it wasn’t his. He didn’t belong in this world, none of them did. “It stabbed me. In the leg. Knocked me out and tried to put me in here. I… I managed to escape but I… I had to stab it Fitz.” She looked back up at him, meeting his eyes.  He saw just how wide they were, how tears were beginning to form, with the first ones already beginning to make tracks down her face. “So when I look at you, I don’t see you shooting Agnes. I see myself. I see myself stabbing you again and again and again. I see you bleeding out in front of me, I hear you crying, begging me not to hurt you.”

He was speechless for a second, not knowing what to say to this, not knowing how to process this. It made him sick to his very core that Jemma had had to go through this, that this is what she saw, what she relived every time that she looked at him. He knew that it was, deep down, his own fault that she had suffered that. That she would never have gone through this had he not created the LMD program, had he not helped Radcliffe perfect it.

“I don’t blame you,” she whispered, looking at him, and using one of her hands to wipe away at her tears. “You didn’t… None of this is you fault,” she continued when he began to protest. “It was Radcliffe, the Darkhold. Please, don’t blame yourself Fitz.”

“If you don’t, then I won’t,” he told her, wondering just how much of it he meant. He knew that her words made sense. He knew what she was trying to say, but he couldn’t shake it, the deep sense of guilt that had nestled in his stomach, that had made its home there. “You did what you had to do Jemma, if you didn’t... “ He had no idea what would have happened to her. Would they have killed her? They did in this Universe. Aida and his father had ordered the strike on the Academy all that time ago now, the attack that had claimed Jemma’s life in here. He remembered how proud Aida (or Ophelia as she went by in this reality) had been when S.H.I.E.L.D. had been eliminated, how her lips had curved up when May had given the briefing, listing the agents who had died, and how Jemma had been among them (he also knew that May had killed her, and he tried not to think about how May would react when she found out that she had killed Jemma). He tried not to think about all the pain and hurt and death he had caused in here (because he had caused so much of if, but he had also caused none of it, really, he hadn’t. He hadn’t been in his right mind but that didn’t matter. Not now.). “You did what you had to do. And we’re together, and we’re alive and we’re going to get out of this, okay?”

She looked at him, nodding, as he moved his arms, wrapping them around her, pulling her in close. She allowed herself to sink into his embrace, savouring the moment as she rested her head against his chest. He allowed his head to come to rest on top of hers, and the two of them remained silent as the jet started to descend.

***

They were so close now to the portal, to the backdoor that would allow them to get home, and escape this hell. It wasn’t the park that they were promised, but an industrial estate instead. Radcliffe promised them that it would still work, and they had no other choice except to trust him. He lead the way, with Daisy behind him and the two other scientists at the rear. They were all armed, and walked in silence. The warehouse was dark, and every shadow was a threat, a danger ready to cause harm.

“There,” Radcliffe whispered, pointing ahead. “That’s the portal.”

Daisy frowned, tilting her head to the side as she looked at where Radcliffe was pointing. It was a vat of molten metal, not a portal and she was about to make a snide comment when the sounds of bullets ricocheting alerted them to the fact that something was wrong.

Fitz pulled Jemma behind a stack of crates whilst Daisy forced Radcliffe to safety, the Inhuman taking down the Hydra agents as she did so. Then there was silence, the sound of gunfire no more as it had been replaced by the sounds of heels clicking.

Aida.

Her voice ran out. “I am disappointed Leopold,” she called out. Jemma turned to look at Fitz, at the colour that had drained from his face and shook her head, telling him not to do something. “I offered you a better life, happiness. I gave you the world, and still, still you chose her.”

Jemma stepped out from behind cover, without really thinking what she was doing, facing the woman who had caused all this, the creator behind this hell. “You think he loves you? You think manipulating him, forcing him into whatever this is… made him happy? It didn’t… all he did was look at me once, and that’s all he needed.”

A snarl crossed Aida’s face and she approached Jemma, her hand wrapping around Jemma’s throat as she lifted her into the air. Jemma struggled, gasping for breath as Aida’s grip tightened around her throat. Darkness became to creep towards the edge of her vision, her body not getting the oxygen that it needed, and Jemma could have sworn she saw a smug smile cross Aida’s face as she realised that she was winning. “You think you’ve won?” She asked Jemma, oblivious to the others (the others who, Jemma really hoped, had a plan). “Killing you now, killing you in here, you’ll die in the real world, you know that?” Her grip tightened once again, and it was so painful, it caused Jemma to cry out, the noise a strangled sound in her throat, and Aida spun, forcing her against a metal pillar, the cold edges stabbing Jemma in the back. “Then all I need to do is reset the simulation once again, make Leopold mine once again, and then nothing can stop us. I’ve won. Do you know that? I’ve won and there’s nothing you can do to…”

A single gunshot rang out, filling the room, and Jemma fell to the floor with a heavy thud, gasping for breath. She felt Fitz pull her into an embrace, and she sank into it, sobbing. It took her several moments to realise what had happened, to see that Fitz had shot Aida, that he had killed her.

Radcliffe and Daisy soon joined them, Radcliffe telling them that they had to keep moving, that they had to get out of here before Alistair sent back up. Jemma nodded, standing up, a little unsteady on her feet and leaning into Fitz as they approached the vat of molten metal.

“It’s under there?” Fitz asked, and Radcliffe nodded. None of them were sure how to even use it, how to get to their world without burning them selves then. “Use your powers.” He turned to Daisy.

She frowned at him. “What?”

“If we push all that away…”

“We can use the portal,” Jemma whispered, turning to smile at Fitz. “Of course.” He returned the smiled before nodding at Daisy, who raised her hands and directed her powers at the thing. It rippled and the parted, revealing...

“The way out,” Radcliffe mused, a sadness to his tone as he realised that he wouldn’t get another chance at life. That this was it for him. “But you have to go now, you know how to shut it down, shut this all down?”

Fitz nodded. “Yeah, yeah, I’m sorry…”

“No.” Radcliffe’s voice was adamant, as he began to push the two of towards the portal. “The fault lies with no one but me.” He stopped and Fitz turned his head, facing Radcliffe. “Please,” he tried again. “Forgive yourself.”

A moment later then Fitz nodded, before he turned back to Jemma. “Are you ready? For whatever comes next?”

“I’ll be there in a couple of hours. Please, please just stay safe.”

“Of course,” he reassured her, allowing himself to steal one more kiss before they both jumped together, back into the real world.

***

She woke up seconds later, back on the Zephyr with Daisy and Piper at her side. She had no idea why it took her later to wake up than Daisy did, considering she had been the one to leave the Framework first. But she paid no attention to it, simply sitting up and swinging her legs over the bed instead.

“Where’s the others?” she asked, standing up on unsteady legs, which immediately buckled underneath her. A pain shot through her leg, and  she collapsed on the ground, trying to fight tears. Daisy was on the ground beside her in seconds, helping to adjust her into a more comfortable position.

“It’s okay,” Daisy told her. “The pain will pass in a moment.”

Jemma nodded. “It just… it took me by surprise. I thought it would heal whilst we were there. How long were we in there?”

Piper allowed herself to come closer. “Just under a week. We had a look at your injuries, Daisy’s seemed to be almost healed, we don’t know why but… yours was deep; we had to change the bandages, apply some cream. We’re gonna need someone to have a look at it once we’re back, someone qualified.

Jemma nodded again, trying to catch up with reality. Daisy looked at her expectantly, as if wanting her to say something more, something else. Then she said it, asked the question that was on her mind. “How far out are we?”

“Just under two hours,” Piper continued, and then went back to Jemma’s question, the one that had remained unanswered. “The others are in the cockpit, have been since Daisy woke up two hours…” She stopped, having said too much.

“Two hours ago?” Jemma asked, realising that there was something wrong, something that she wasn’t being told. “You’ve been out for two hours?”

Daisy paused as Jemma turned to her, she had no idea what to tell her friend. How she could tell Jemma that she had just laid there, motionless and seemingly asleep for two hours. “Your vitals, everything, they were all normal. We just… we didn’t know what to do. We just… we just waited and for two hours there was nothing. You were just there.”

Jemma blinked at her, eyes wide and then she shook her head, and reaching up beside her, she pulled herself back to her feet, groaning as she did so. Her leg felt like it was on fire, and she wasn’t able to put any weight on it, but that didn’t matter and pushing herself from the bed, she began to hobble out of the room.

“Jemma!” Daisy cried, wondering what her friend was up to. “Where are you going?”

Jemma looked over her shoulder. “To get ready.” Her tone dared Daisy to challenge her, dared Daisy to defy her. Because the two of them were in this together, and there was no going back no. There was no doing this alone. They were in this together, until the end. “Because Aida, god knows what she has waiting for us there. And I’m not going there unprepared. I’m not losing Fitz again.”

And with that, she stormed out of the room, and Daisy tried to follow her but Piper grabbed her wrist, and shook her head.

***

When they did arrive, Daisy tried to talk Jemma out of going into the base one more time, tried to tell her that she was still injured, that she and the others would go in and grab the team, but Jemma was not taking any of it.

So there they were, standing outside, as Daisy quaked the lock off the door. It creaked open, and the six of them crept in together, and wandered the dark corridors. They were moving slow, Jemma’s leg and Daisy’s own injuries slowing them down.

Thankfully, they met no difficulties, no foes, no danger, nothing and soon, they were standing outside the door to the room where their team was.

Piper, Davis and Prince fell back as the others entered the room. Elena immediately went to Mack, joining him where he was sitting on the floor, their heads coming together as they fell into a hushed conversation. Daisy walked over to where May and Coulson where, tending to an injured Mace and Jemma went to Fitz, because, who else would she go to?

She ignored the pain in her leg as she hobbled over to him, wrapping her arms around him and collapsing into his embrace. He held onto her tight as she sobbed into his chest, rubbing his hands up and down her back, telling her that it was okay, that they were safe, they were alive and they were together.

He couldn’t help the tears that streamed down his own face, and he just allowed himself to enjoy the moment. Because they were okay, they were safe, they were alive and they were together.

“I can’t lose you again,” she whispered, pulling her head back and looking up at him.

He smiled down at her, and wiped away the tears. “You won’t,” he told her, a promise. Because he wasn’t going to lose her, not again. Not after everything they’ve been through. He wasn’t going to let the cosmos rip them apart again.

“I love you.” The three words were nothing more than a murmur from her, and she tilted her head up, allowing herself to kiss him.

Jemma’s arms went up to his neck, the both of them hooking around it and pulling him closer, holding him close and not wanting to let him go. Not wanting to lose him just after she had got him back again. His own arms held her around her waist, supportive and firm.

It was a tender kiss, long and deep and slow, and they were reluctant to pull apart, and when they did, they just allowed their foreheads to come to rest together. Jemma used one of her hands and brought it up to his face, her fingers trailing down his features. She didn’t need to commit them to memory, they were already there. He dropped his lips once again, placing a kiss on the end of her nose before bringing her in for another kiss. The hand that had been resting against his cheek, taking in his features that had remained unshaven for a week now slid up, her fingers curling around the back of his head and burying themselves in his curls.

He nipped on her lip slightly with his teeth, a low moan escaping the back her throat. In that moment, Jemma just forgot about everything, losing herself in the moment with Fitz and when he pulled away, she pouted, somewhat disappointment.

“When we…” he began, placing another quick kiss on her lips, nothing more than a peck, and continuing to do so between each word. “Get out of here, we go away? Just the two of us?”

“Where?”

He smiled down at her, using the side of this thumb to stroke her cheek. “How about the Seychelles?”


End file.
